Assam’s conservationist Dr Bibhuti lahkar has won the prestigious Heritage Hero Award for the year 2016 by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) beating other four contenders from different part of the World. Dr lahkar is the first one from Assam to receive the prestigious award.
The Heritage Heroes Awards Committee, which honoured Dr lahkar at the IUCN World Conservation Congress at Hawaii on Saturday also recognises other contenders including Bantu lukambo and Josué Kambasu Mukura as well as Yulia Naberezhnaya and Andrey Rudomakha for their efforts to conserve the nature.
While Bantu lukambo and Josué Kambasu Mukura were nominated jointly this year for their work in protecting Virunga National Park in DRC, Yulia Naberezhnaya and Andrey Rudomakha were nominated jointly for their conservation works in Western Caucasus in Russia.
In a statement by the IUCN, the international conservation body said that lahkar has devoted his life to the conservation of Manas Wildlife Sanctuary in Assam. “An expert in human-wildlife conflict mitigation, he showed how humans and elephants, for example, can live side by side. He has empowered some 300 young people to be directly engaged in the site’s protection, including 100 whom he trained as tour guides, and has helped train converted poachers on the monitoring of wildlife,” the statement said.
“Manas is a World Heritage site and is a universal property and it is our moral responsibility to protect it,” said Dr lahkar while speaking at the function. “I just try my very best. My work is not only based on research, it is also aimed at building the next generation to empower them with education and opportunities for livelihood,” lahkar said.
It may be mentioned here that the Manas Wildlife Sanctuary, located in Western Assam, was withdrawn from the list of World Heritage in Danger in 2011, after almost two decades of armed conflict and Dr lahkar played a crucial role in this transformation.
The objective of Heritage Heroes Award is to inspire people to value the importance of natural World Heritage sites and recognise the need to collectively invest in their conservation.
Dr lahkar played a critical role in the rehabilitation of surrendered poachers, enabling them to lead a dignified and socially meaningful life. His team also worked hard to train around 600 members of local grassroots NGOs, including ex-poachers who now act as protectors of Manas. His efforts also empowered the locam communities as he focused on women and offered them regular income opportunities by encouraging them to form ‘self-help groups’ and engaging them in alternative livelihoods such as food processing, weaving and fishery.